Costa offers redress to Concordia victims
Source: Agencies |
January 28, 2012, Saturday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
COSTA Crociere SpA is offering uninjured passengers 11,000 euros (US$14,460) each to compensate them for lost baggage and psychological trauma after its cruise ship ran aground and capsized off Tuscany, Italy, when the captain deviated from his route.
Costa, a unit of the world's biggest cruise operator, Miami-based Carnival Corp, also said it would reimburse passengers the full costs of their cruise, their travel expenses and any medical expenses sustained after the grounding.
The agreement was announced yesterday after negotiations between Costa representatives and Italian consumer groups who say they represent 3,206 cruise ship passengers from 61 countries who suffered no physical harm when the Costa Concordia hit a reef on January 13.
The deal does not apply to the hundreds of crew on the ship, the roughly 100 cases of people injured or the families who lost loved ones.
Passengers are free to pursue legal action on their own if they aren't satisfied with the deal.
Some consumer groups have already signed on as injured parties in the criminal case against the Concordia's captain, Francesco Schettino, who is accused of manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning the ship before all passengers were evacuated. He is under house arrest.
In addition, Codacons, one of Italy's best known consumer groups, has engaged two US law firms to launch a class-action lawsuit against Costa and Carnival in Miami, claiming it expects to get 125,000 euros to 1 million euros per passenger.
Codacons has also called for a criminal investigation into the practice of steering cruise ships close to shore to give passengers and people on land a thrill.
Costa Chief Executive Pier Luigi Foschi told an Italian parliamentary committee this week that so-called "tourist navigation" wasn't illegal, and was a "cruise product" sought out by passengers.
Schettino has admitted he had taken the ship on "touristic navigation" but has said the rocks he hit weren't charted on his nautical maps.
Costa, a unit of the world's biggest cruise operator, Miami-based Carnival Corp, also said it would reimburse passengers the full costs of their cruise, their travel expenses and any medical expenses sustained after the grounding.
The agreement was announced yesterday after negotiations between Costa representatives and Italian consumer groups who say they represent 3,206 cruise ship passengers from 61 countries who suffered no physical harm when the Costa Concordia hit a reef on January 13.
The deal does not apply to the hundreds of crew on the ship, the roughly 100 cases of people injured or the families who lost loved ones.
Passengers are free to pursue legal action on their own if they aren't satisfied with the deal.
Some consumer groups have already signed on as injured parties in the criminal case against the Concordia's captain, Francesco Schettino, who is accused of manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning the ship before all passengers were evacuated. He is under house arrest.
In addition, Codacons, one of Italy's best known consumer groups, has engaged two US law firms to launch a class-action lawsuit against Costa and Carnival in Miami, claiming it expects to get 125,000 euros to 1 million euros per passenger.
Codacons has also called for a criminal investigation into the practice of steering cruise ships close to shore to give passengers and people on land a thrill.
Costa Chief Executive Pier Luigi Foschi told an Italian parliamentary committee this week that so-called "tourist navigation" wasn't illegal, and was a "cruise product" sought out by passengers.
Schettino has admitted he had taken the ship on "touristic navigation" but has said the rocks he hit weren't charted on his nautical maps.
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